



SKETCH 

OF THE 

JAPAN MISSION 


Rf.vised and Brought Down to 1922 
BY 

REV. H. V. S. PEEKE, D.D. 


BOARD OF FOREIGN MISSIONS 
Reformed Church in America 
25 East 22d Street 


New York 



AN HISTORICAL SKETCH 

OF THE 

JAPAN MISSION 

OF THE REFORMED CHURCH IN AMERICA 

It is very difficult to write a sketch of a single period 
of history, since history is not like a succession of lakes, 
but an on-flowing river. Periods overlap, and there is 
never a distinct break in sequence. 

It is easy to give the details of the founding of a 
Mission, but the events of the subsequent decades are so 
interwoven with the activities of other Christian workers, 
and so bound up with the current of secular history, that a 
sketch, distinct in detail, is well nigh impossible. 

This is eminently true of a sketch of the history of a 
Mission in Japan. From the very beginning, in 1859, a 
number of Missions of different denominations have worked 
together in unusual harmony. Conditions have been un- 
favorable to the development of outstanding individualities 
of missionary leaders. Other conditions have worked toward 
the up-building of friendships that have ignored denomina- 
tional lines. Mission compounds have hardly existed at 
all, and there has never been any extensive delimitation of 
territory. 

Co-operative Activities 

The missionaries of the Reformed Church in America 
were prominent from the very beginning in a movement 
that obliterated the distinction between Presbyterian and 
Reformed, a movement which was followed by similar 
movements that wove together the various members of 
the Methodist family, the various members of the Baptist 
family, and others as well, into ecclesiastical family groups. 
Later they have been leaders in the movement that has 
amalgamated these groups into the Conference of Federated 
Missions. 

These movements, with the development of an independent 
Japanese church, and constantly increasing affiliation and 
co-operation, have made the task of the historian more and 
more difficult. The later chapters of the Mission sketch 


3 


succeeding this may well be simply a description of the 
Christian movement in Japan, with the relation thereto of 
the missionaries of the Reformed Church indicated in foot- 
notes. 

Even at present our Bibles and other religious books and 
tracts are published by all for each. We not only labor 
together in education, but educate for one another. We 
are on the threshold of an elaborate plan for advertising 
the Gospel together in the newspapers, and we will work 
together in the conservation of the results. Denominational 
lines are not entirely obliterated, and denominational ex- 
cellencies are not forgotten, but our missionaries have ever 
been leaders in the idea that it is first and foremost the 
Kingdom of Heaven that we are seeking to establish. 

PERIOD OF INDIVIDUAL ENDEAVOR 

It is so customary to study history by periods that in 
spite of the difficulties involved, we shall, in this sketch, 
consider first the Individualistic Period, the days before 
there were any institutions such as schools, and tract and 
publishing societies, the days when missionaries worked as 
it were with bare hands, without tools and devices. 

We will begin the period in 1859, the year in which mis- 
sionaries, and ours among them, first landed in the empire, 
and extend it down to 1875, in which year we record the 
opening of Ferris Seminary, the first school for girls in 
the islands, founded on the Bluff at Yokohama, and prosper- 
ously conducted by our Mission on the same site today. 

Japan As It Was 

Before proceeding to review the period itself, we should 
try to understand the conditions of the country at its 
opening. Five years before, in 1854, Japan had concluded 
treaties of amity and peace with Western powers — not 
because she wished to, but because she could not well refuse. 
She could see some advantages from trade, but she did 
not want intercourse, or opium, or the Christian religion. 
Opium she has kept out. She has prospered greatly by 
trade, and has benefited more from the insistent Chris- 
tian propaganda than she realizes. 

4 


At this time Japan had a civilization all her own, but 
in spite of its excellencies, it was hopelessly at variance 
with the outside world. There were no means of rapid 
communication, no posts, no telegraphs, no national school 
system, indeed, no recognized national organization. Its 
feudal organization was crumbling to a fall. Two ideas 
dominated the public mind, a fear and distrust of every- 
thing foreign, and a fear and hate of the Christian re- 
ligion. The notice-boards warning the people, under severe 
penalty, against having any relations whatsoever with 
Christianity, were still in evidence, and were not removed 
until 1873. The language was all unknown to Westerners, 
and there were no helps to its acquisition written in the 
English language, and almost none in any other language. 

Japan, from the very start, has presented peculiar diffi- 
culties as a mission field. While the mass of the people have 
not shown themselves unfriendly, they have always main- 
tained a marked reserve in revealing their deeper feelings 
and in coming into close social relations with foreigners. 
The Government has never shown itself unfriendly to the 
modern Christian enterprise. On the contrary, it has on 
many occasions apparently gone out of its way to make 
the path of the missionaries easy. There have been no 
persecutions, and no case of martyrdom among the mis- 
sionaries, but on the other hand it has never been easy to 
disabuse one’s self of the idea that were it not for a subtle 
constraint, impossible to point out, but no less real, on the 
part of the authorities, the Japanese would have turned to 
the Church by scores where they now come as individuals. 

Shortly after the opening of the country in 1854, Dr. 
S. Wells Williams and Rev. E. W. Syle, missionaries to 
China, happening to be in Nagasaki, went with Chaplain 
Wood, of the U. S. S. Powhatan, to call on the governor 
of the city. During the conversation the governor said that 
now the country was open for trade, and the people would 
be glad to receive anything the foreigners had to bring, 
except opium and Christianity. The remark naturally im- 
pressed these Christian men, and they agreed each to write 
to a Mission Board, urging the sending of missionaries to 
the Japanese. One of these letters was received by the 

5 


Board of l^'oreign Missions of the Reformed Church in 
America, and was the first in a number of providences that 
led to the sending out of the first band of our missionaries 
to this empire. 

The First Missionaries 

In May of 1859 the first missionaries arrived. They were 
the Revs. Williams and Liggins, of the Protestant Episco- 
pal Church. They had been laboring for several years in 
China, and were now transferred to found the Japan Mis- 
sion. In October Dr. J. C. Hepburn was transferred from 
China to Japan to found the Mission of the Presbyterian 
Church of the United States. On November 1st, our first 
missionaries. Rev. S. R. Brown and Dr. D. B. Simmons, 
landed in Yokohama, and on November 7th Rev. G. F. 
Verbeck arrived in Nagasaki. The wives and families of 
three joined them on December 29th of that year. 

We can do no better for this period, 1859 to 1875, than 
to consider the individuals connected with the Mission and 
their work, showing the part each took in laying the 
foundations for the period that followed, when institutions 
and appliances caused missionary operations to assume a 
new form with a brighter outlook. 

Dr. S. R. Brown had had considerable experience in 
educational work before coming to Japan, and had already 
attained the maturity of forty-nine years. At the present 
day no Board would consider for a moment commissioning 
a man of that age, and yet Dr. Brown, during the twenty 
years of service he was able to give, made a marked con- 
tribution to the work, and left an enviable impression upon 
tbe Mission just being born. Someone writes of him that 
“He was a fine musician, a natural linguist, a careful 
student of the Japanese language, and a thorough teacher.” 
He taught classes of young men which were forerunners of 
later classes in the Meiji Gakuin, Tokyo. He was chairman 
of the New Testament translation committee from its 
inception until his retirement from the field in 1879, and 
took a prominent part in its activities. Through some of 
his pupils his impress upon the work is still felt. 

6 



Rev. S.'\muel R. Brown, D.D. 


7 


Di'. Guido F. Vei-beck, upon graduation from a Presby- 
terian Seminary, was commissioned by the Board of Foreign 
Missions of the Reformed (Dutch) Church, because, for 
one reason, he was a Hollander, and it was thought this 
would be of decided advantage in inaugurating work in 
Japan, especially if he were stationed in Nagasaki, which, 
for a couple of centuries, through a small settlement of 
Dutch merchants, had maintained a more or less close 
touch with the culture of Holland. His service extended 
over nearly forty years, and if any one name stands out 
prominently in the history of Japan Missions, it is the name 
of Verbeck. He was a man of liberal education and broad 
culture. He had clear and definite opinions on a wide 
variety of subjects, and yet was withal a man of sincere 
piety and deep humility. 

The first ten years of Dr. Verbeck’s service were spent 
in Nagasaki, teaching in a Government school and obtain- 
ing a singularly thorough and skillful use of the Japanese 
language. Indeed, during this period, and for many years 
after, there seems to have been no second to Dr. Verbeck’s 
first. It was his privilege to baptize two men in 1866, the 
first to be baptized in the southern part of the empire, 
preceded by only one other in the north. He made a deep 
impression on his pupils, and when some of them were 
afterward in Government circles in Tokyo, and it was nec- 
essary to find a man competent to organize Japan’s first 
college. Dr. Verbeck was invited to take up the task. For 
nearly ten years he was in Government employ, and was a 
friend and trusted adviser of men of important position. 
The details and extent of his service will probably never be 
fully known to outsiders. 

His connection with the Government did not in the least 
impair his fitness and enthusiasm for the tasks of a Mis- 
sionary. He returned to the work he loved best of all, and, 
for a score of years, labored, sometimes as an instructor in 
the theological seminary, again on the Revising Committee 
of the Old Testament, and always as a preacher and lec- 
turer. He never took much interest in the problems of 
Mission management or the organization of the church. 
When in attendance upon meetings of classis, or presbytery. 




9 


Rev. G. F. Verbeck, D.D. Rev. J. H. Bali.agh. D.D. 


he liked nothing better than to get from 
the moderator an excuse for absence, 
and then, with some congenial Japanese 
brother, start off on a preaching tour. 
He was regarded with the deepest 
affection by all, and is still remembered 
as the “great Japanese preacher and 
the model Christian gentleman.” 

Dr. James H. Ballagh came to the 
Mission in 1861, and his connection 
lasted unbroken for fifty-nine years. He 
never engaged to any extent in educational work, and did 
not have special interest in problems of administration. 
He was rather a John the Baptist, of burning evangelistic 
zeal, casting up the highway, preparing the way of the 
Lord, and ever bidding men, by the wayside, in the home, 
and from the pulpit, to repent and believe the Gospel. He 
was unceasing and mighty in prayer. 

Yokohama was Dr. Ballagh’s home from the first. There 
he baptized the first Protestant convert, in 1864, and in 

1872, organized, with nine members, the first church. But 
his activity was unbounded, and his name and work are 
remembered with gratitude and affection in such country 
districts as Shinshu and Izu. It was in large measure due 
to the activity of Dr. Ballagh that, in 1875, the Kaigan 
Church building, one of the first edifices to be seen on 
arrival at the port, was erected. 

The First Single-Lady Missionary 

Miss Mary E. Kidder was the first unmarried lady mis- 
sionary to come to Japan, the forerunner of scores of 
members of this useful and efficient company. She arrived 
in 1869, lived for a year in Niigata, and then, returning to 
Yokohama, took over a class of girls that had been gath- 
ered and taught by Mrs. Hepburn, of the Presbyterian 
Mission. This class prospered in a suburb, and developed 
into Ferris Seminary, which was opened on its present site 
in 1875, and is to this day one of the best schools of its 
kind. Miss Kidder married Rev. E. Rothsay Miller in 

1873, and enjoyed his assistance in the school work for a 
time. Dr. Miller came to Japan in 1872, and joined the 



10 


mission of the Reformed Church in 
1874, after his marriage with Miss 
Kidder. 

Dr. and Mrs. Miller severed their 
connection with Ferris Seminary in 
1879, and their fruitful labors were con- 
tinued during many years, principally 
in the evangelistic field, for some time 
at Morioka, three hundred miles north 
of Tokyo. For a long time, indeed 
until her death, Mrs. Miller edited 
and published “Joyful Tidings,” a Sun- 
day-school paper widely read, and still 
hands. This couple was famed alike 
and generosity. Mrs. Miller fell on sleep in 1913, after 
forty-four years of service, and her husband followed her 
two years later. 

A number of names, such as Miss C. Adriance, Miss E. 
C. Witbeck, Dr. D. B. Simmons, and C. H. H. Wolff, 
belong to this period, but their connection with the Mission 
was of short duration, and no extended reference is called 
for. 

We may close the record with reference to Dr. and Mrs. 
Henry Stout, who arrived in Nagasaki in 1869, ten days 
before Dr. Verbeck left for Tokyo, which then, as now, was 
the center of the national life of Japan. This couple, like 
their predecessors, labored alone for ten years before asso- 
ciates joined them. Mrs. Stout continued in the Mission 
thirty-three years, till her death, in 1902. Dr. Stout retired 
from the Mission two years later. 

Dr. and Mrs. Stout were pioneers in a peculiar way. 
Mrs. Stout, during the early years gathered a class of girls 
that afterward developed into Sturges Seminary, and did 
capital work in training wives for the first evangelists. 
Dr. Stout, after a few years of teaching in a Government 
school, withdrew that he might devote himself to preaching 
and to the inception of his own school work. His classes 
developed into Steele Academy, which had for a number of 
years, as its cap-stone, a theological department in which 
not a few excellent young men were trained for Christian 



Rev. Henry Stout, D.D. 


conducted by other 
for culture, piety 


11 


service. This couple were strong in piety and purpose, and 
their imprint is left upon the Kyushu field today to a 
degree, perhaps, not fully realized by their successors. 
Their classes, made up of handfuls, prepared the way for 
the Steele Academy and Sturges Seminary of today, with 
their hundreds, and, until recently, the majority of the 
evangelists in the south were Dr. Stout’s hand-picked men. 

With this ends the period during which the individual 
looms up larger than the institution, — the pioneer period. 
At its close there were eight Missions working in the empire 
besides the original three. There must have been a couple 
of score of missionaries. Baptisms were no longer uncom- 
mon. Missionaries were free to preach in the open ports, 
and, in spite of difficulties, the Gospel was being pushed out 
into the interior. As to our own work, Ferris Seminary 
was just starting out on its organized career at its present 
location; classes of young men were being taught in Yoko- 
hama by Dr. Brown, and others, to be incorporated later in 
the Meiji Gakuin, at Tokyo, while classes for both young 
women and young men existed in Nagasaki, carried on by 
Dr. and Mrs. Stout. Attempts at evangelistic work were 
being made by Drs. Ballagh, Stout and Miller. Dr. Verbeck 
was still in the employ of the Government. 

THE INSTITUTIONAL PERIOD 

EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTIONS 

Coming to the Institutional Period of our Mission’s his- 
tory, we will review, first, the educational work for young 
men and young women carried on in the south. We begin 
here since we must begin somewhere, and since this work 
has never enjoyed the distinction of being the principal 
educational work of our Church in Japan, it will be some- 
thing of a compensation to give it a leading place in the 
recital. 

The Reformed Church has always stood pledged to higher 
education and to an educated ministry. It has always been 
true to this policy on its Mission fields. Besides that, in 
Japan, for many years, the contacts necessary for evange- 
listic endeavor were obtainable best, and in many places 
solely, by means of educational institutions. 

12 


Dr. and Mrs. Stout early shaped their endeavors in this 
direction. On a corner of their residence lot a small build- 
ing was erected that sheltered, alternately, classes for 
30ung men and classes for young women. Mrs. Stout will 
always be thought of as the pioneer of education for women 
in the south, but she also spent many hours teaching young 
men. The early years were very disappointing. They had 
been in Japan ten years when the Misses Farrington came 
out for the work of the school for girls, only to retire 
almost immediately for health reasons. A year later Dr. 
and Mrs. Booth came out. On Dr. Stout’s return from fur- 
lough, they moved to Yokohama, to take up work in Ferris 
Seminary, leaving education in the south in the hands of 
Dr. and Mrs. Stout, as before. Permanency was not 
attained for the young women’s work until the arrival of 
Miss M. E. Brokaw, in 1884, and, for the young men’s 
work until the coming of Dr. and Mrs. Oltmans, in 1886. 
Even at that, the work can hardly be said to have been 
really established till the fall of 1887, nearly thirty years 
after the arrival of Dr. Verbeck, when Sturges Seminary 
proudly took possession of new buildings, largely the gift 
of Mrs. Jonathan Sturges, and Steele Academy moved into 
its new property, provided by Dr. William H. Steele, in 
memory of his son. 

Steele Academy in 1888 

Education in Japan was at that time by no means the 
finely organized thing it has since become, and our schools, 
also, were very crude, but it is no exaggeration to say that 
from the very first, viewed from either a religious or edu- 
cational standpoint, they were effective institutions. In the 
new buildings, Steele had a little over one hundred pupils. 
There was much coming and going; perhaps a hundred 
entries a year, with the total changing almost none at all. 

As the years went on, there were many changes in the 
personnel. Down to the present Messrs. Stout, Oltmans, 
Peeke, Pieters, Myers, Davis, Hoekje, Walvoord, Shafer, 
Ruigh, and Miss Taylor have been connected with Steele, 
some for a longer, some for a shorter period. The out- 
standing names are Stout, Pieters and Walvoord. Dr. 


13 


stout founded the school and stood by it through thick and 
thin. Mr. Pieters took charge at a critical time, reorgan- 
ized the institution, and brought it into affiliation with the 
Government system. Mr. Walvoord’s contribution was per- 
haps greatest of all. He was a man of vision. Early in 
the fourteen years of his connection with the school he 
began to picture to himself what the school should be in 
numbers, discipline and equipment, and worked steadily to 
achieve his ideal. When he suddenly died, in September, 
1919, he had carried the school quite as far along these 
lines as it was possible for any one man to do. 

In the late eighties, the school was in charge of a Japa- 
nese principal, but, as the arrangement, due largely to the 
lack of vigor on the part of the appointee, was unsatis- 
factory, a Missionary was again put in charge. In 1916 
the conduct of the school was entrusted to a board of six 
directors, a number of whom were Japanese. This arrange- 
ment is satisfactory and will be continued. As soon as a 
suitable candidate can be found, it is likely that once more 
a Japanese principal will be installed. 

From the beginning until 1897 theological instruction 
was carried on in connection with the school, principally 
by Dr. Stout, assisted most of the time by Rev. A. Segawa, 
and for a short time by Dr. R. B. Grinnan of the Southern 
Presbyterian Mission. The high-water mark was reached 
in 1894, when twenty-four students were in attendance. 
Some of the graduates of this department are still doing 
yeoman service in the Church. The department was sus- 
pended in 1897. 

Steele Academy, or Tosan Gakuin, as it is called in 
Japanese, is an institution of which the Church may well 
be proud. It has a staff of two American and eighteen 
Japanese teachers, with three hundred and sixty pupils. It 
is located on a handsome site, overlooking Nagasaki harbor, 
and has an excellent reputation in that region. The chang- 
ing years have made considerable differences in the per- 
sonnel of the students. These were at first drawn from all 
parts of the island of Kyushu but today, with perhaps 
thrice the number of students, the patronage is principally 
from Nagasaki city and prefecture. However, the efficiency 

14 



IS 


Steele Academy 


of the school as an evangelizing agency is not impaired, 
and it is as useful as ever as a place in which to try ou 
candidates for the ministry. 


Sturges Seminary 

The American missionary teachers in Sturges Semi- 
nary have been numerous. Among the names are those of 
the Misses Brokaw, Lanterman, Irvine, Couch, Lansing, 
Duryea, Stryker, Stout, Thomasma, Pieters, and, after the 
removal of the school to Shimonoseki, Noordhoff and Olt- 
mans. In 1891 the school was put in charge of a Japanese 
principal. This arrangement proved quite satisfactory, and 
has continued till the present. 

The names of Mrs. Henry Stout and of Miss S. M. Couch 
will ever be most closely identified with the history of the 
school, the former as a sort of forerunner of its succes- 
sion of teachers and the latter as one who very deeply 
impressed her character on the school during the long 
years of her connection with it. Miss Couch came to Japan 
for evangelistic work, but the necessities of the situation 
soon drew her into the school, and she worked in it almost 
continuously from her arrival in 1891 until the removal of 
the school in 1914, and she still has a close acquaintance 
with the graduates of the school. 

During the early years of the school’s history, it suf- 
fered, as all our work suffered, from the reaction of the 
late eighties, but, after that, it gradually improved in 
attendance until the accommodations, originally prepared 
for forty odd, were crowded with nearly a hundred stu- 
dents. The difficulty was now no longer to draw pupils, 
but to find the means with which to maintain a really good 
school, a credit to the Church and a blessing to its patrons. 

At Yamaguchi, one hundred and fifty miles to the north, 
the Presbyterian Church in the United States had, for a 
couple of decades, been maintaining a girls’ school, called 
Kojo Jo-gakko. It was not so large or so well equipped as 
ours, but it had rendered excellent service under the man- 
agement of Miss Gertrude Bigelow and others. A portion 
of the Kennedy bequest had been assigned to this school, 
and it was debated whether to rebuild at Yamaguchi or 


16 



Sturges Seminary 


move southward to Shimonoseki, a point midway on the 
road to Nagasaki. They felt they did not have funds suf- 
ficient to erect and carry on a first-class school, so it was 
proposed that we sell out our Nagasaki property to the 
contiguous Methodist Girls’ School, and that a joint work 
be instituted at Shimonoseki. This was eventually carried 
out, and now the heights on the north side of the Shimono- 
seki Straits are crowned by an excellent institution, super- 
vised by a joint board of directors and efficiently conducted 
by Mr. T. Hirotsu, formerly principal of the Nagasaki 
school. 

The new school has a staff of four American Missionaries 
and sixteen Japanese teachers. The pupils number two 
hundred and twenty-one in all, and, in spite of limitation 
in accommodations, the school is ministering not only to 
the young women of the immediate vicinity, but to the 
daughters of Japanese families from Korea, China and For- 
mosa, the returning steamers from which countries all call 
at the beautiful harbor upon which the school faces. 


17 



]''ekkis Seminary 

The mission of the Reformed Church was very early in 
the educational field in the Tokyo-Yokohama region. In 
1870 Miss Kidder took over a class that had been gathered 
by Mrs. Hepburn, of the Presbyterian Mission, at a time 
when it was not easy to get pupils of any kind. She soon 
passed the boys on to others, and retained six girls. Dur- 
ing the second year these became twenty-two, and the 
school moved to the suburbs of Yokohama, but later came 
back and located on the Bluff, at the present site of Ferris 
Seminary. 

The school was formally opened as Ferris Seminary on 
June 1, 1875, and, after various experiences of prosperity 
and adversity, is, at the date of writing, 192d, enjoying the 
most prosperous period of its history. The school is not, 
as formerly, pre-eminently a boarding school, and, while 
still famous for music and cultural education, it has been 
influenced by the demands of the times to inaugurate busi- 
ness courses. The school has maintained a high grade 
religiously and socially from the beginning. 

Since 1881 the school has continuously been in charge of 
Dr. E. S. Booth, and a great deal of the success is due to 
the persistency with which he has put into operation his 
educational policies. He has enjoyed the co-operation of a 
large number of excellent women workers, among whom we 
may mention his wife, Emily Stelle Booth, Miss Winn, Miss 
Witbeck, Miss Carrie Ballagh, Miss Anna Ballagh, Miss 
Dick, Miss Moulton, Miss Kuyper, Miss Demarest and Miss 
Oltmans. 

The school now has an enrollment of four hundred and 
fourteen pupils, of whom fifty-seven are in the boarding 
department. Its buildings stand prominently on a hill, and 
catch the eye of all travelers as they enter Yokohama har- 
bor. Similarly, the school stands prominent in the com- 
munity, and is doing its full mead of duty in enlightening 
and leading. 

Meiji Gakuin 

Our participation in the education of boys began in 
1881, when Dr. Martin N. Wyckoff opened the Seishi 


18 



Ferris Seminary 



Gakko in Yokohama. In 1883 this was removed to Tokyo 
and united with a prosperous school conducted by the Pres- 
byterian Mission. Previous to this the Presbyterian and 
Reformed Missions had been united in theological instruc- 
tion in Tokyo. In 1886 these institutions were combined in 
a school known as the Meiji Gakuin, and, in a year or two, 
both departments were suitably housed on a commodious 
compound in the southern part of the city. A collegiate 
department was later added, and today (1922) the combined 
school is still going strong, with seven hundred and forty 
pupils in the Academy, one hundred and fifty in the 
College, and sixteen in the Theological Department. 

The school is supported about half by fees and about half 
by grants from the Presbyterian and the Reformed Mis- 
sions. It is managed by a Board of Directors, about half 
of whom are Japanese gentlemen. Dr. Ibuka has been the 
president for thirty years. Our Missionaries who have 
been for considerable periods connected with the school are 
Drs. Amerman, Oltmans, Wyckoff, Hoffsommer, Peeke, and 
Mr. Ruigh. 

EVANGELISTIC OPERATIONS 

The above gives a fairly comprehensive account of our 
institutional work, but it would be a mistake not to 
endeavor to give some idea of the effort that has been put 
forth along general evangelistic lines during this period of 
the history of the Mission, even though the work of this 
kind does not readily lend itself to portrayal. The Mission 
has ever stood for the principle that the ultimate object of 
all our operations is evangelism, and, although it has some- 
times seemed necessary to curtail our evangelistic work on 
account of crises developing in the schools, it has been pos- 
sible, in the main, to be true to our principle. 

Kyushu 

The evangelistic work in Kyushu was begun by Dr. 
Henry Stout. Dr. Verbeck had preceded him, but confined 
his efforts almost entirely to the city of Nagasaki. Indeed, 
he could have done little else in view of the restrictions on 
travel. For many years Dr. Stout worked single-handed, 

20 



Meiji Gakuin, Tokyo 

View From Second Story of Dr. Oet man’s Nousk 

and, though he did some touring in the interior he felt that 
his best service could be rendered by training a number of 
young men for working among their own people in the 
inland cities. Among his earliest students were A. Segawa 
and I. Tomegawa. Mr. Segawa was the first ready to be 
sent forth, and, in 1878, went to Kagoshima, the capital of 
the Province of Satsuma. Kagoshima was an important 
city at that time, and its people were distinguished for 
their progressive spirit. 

Early in the eighties. Rev. N. S. Demarest was ready to 
undertake more aggressive evangelistic work, and by that 
time there were a number of Japanese evangelists located 
in the southern, northeastern and central portions of the 
large island. About 1890, on the withdrawal of Mr. Dem- 
arest, Rev. A. Oltmans was diverted from work in the 
academy, and gave himself up to touring the out-stations. 
These were the days when there were no railroads, and the 
travel of the Missionary meant riding day after day in jin- 


21 



rikisha or in small and uncomfortable coasting steamers. 
However, the foreigner was a novelty, and his seconding 
of the efforts of the Japanese evangelist was singularly 
effective. 

Interior Stations 

In 1893 Rev. and Mrs. H. V. S. Peeke joined the Mission, 
and were stationed in Kagoshima. This was our first 
inland station in the south, and residence at that point 
made it possible for Mr. Peeke to develop the region until 
there were six evangelists stationed at various points in 
the south of the island. 

In 1895, upon their return from furlough, Mr. and Mrs. 
Oltmans were stationed at Saga, thus opening our second 
interior point. Owing to passport difficulties and incon- 
veniences of travel and residence, the transfer of evangel- 
istic Missionaries from the port to interior cities was not 
easy to carry out, but the movement, once started, has con- 
tinued to this day. Kagoshima, Saga, Oita, Kurume, 
Fukuoka, and even smaller towns like Miyakonojo and 
Karatsu, have been, and most of them still are, the loca- 
tions of our Missionaries, and the names of Revs. Oltmans, 
Peeke, Pieters, Kuyper, Ryder, Hoekje, Van Bronkhorst, 
Van Strien, and the Misses Lansing, Couch, Buys, Hospers, 
Evelyn Oltmans and Kuyper, are found among those who, 
most of them for many years, have witnessed for Christ 
in the interior of the island. 

Four Fields 

For geographical reasons, our work in Kyushu covers 
three fields, one in the south, with Kagoshima as the cen- 
ter; another in the northeast of the island, centering at 
Oita, and the other in the center of the island, including 
the large cities of Saga, Fukuoka and Kurume. Perhaps a 
fourth should be added, the region at the west, with Naga- 
saki as a center, including, also, the large city of Sasebo. 

It is fairly easy to acquire a working knowledge of the 
Japanese language, but, to reside in an interior city, to 
make contacts of a vital and friendly nature with Japa- 
nese men and women, and to bring constantly to bear upon 


22 




23 


Rev. Ickiro Tomeg,\wa Rev. A. Segawa 



them in a winning manner the claims of Jesus Christ, 
demand courage, patience and faith of no slight degree. It 
is easy to fall into routine, to dissipate one’s energies, to 
become inactive, to grow weary on account of lack of 
adequate response, but our Missionaries confer often for 
the mutual stimulation of faith and improvement of method, 
and, at the close of the first quarter of the century, are 
effective as never before. With the exception of the estab- 
lishment of kindergartens, it would seem that every known 
method of evangelism is being tried. 

From the very beginning the ordained Missionaries have 
persisted in touring and preaching at towns where Japa- 
nese evangelists have been stationed, as well as in smaller 
places round about. Believers have been organized into 
small groups, and later into churches. In the Tokyo region 
there are now many churches that, as the offshoots of 
other churches, have never known the helping hand of a 
Missionary, but in Kyushu, with one exception, every con- 
gregation owes its existence to the planting and watering 
of some Missionary. 

Su nday Schools 

The Sunday-school work of Miss Lansing, Miss Couch 
and others, as well as that of students of Sturges and 
Ferris, has for many years been a source of pride. The 
difficulties of organization connected with kindergartens 
have been obviated, and yet large numbers of children have 
obtained their first lessons in Gospel truth, and many par- 
ents have been reached through their children. 

Newspaper Evangelism 

Since 1912, Rev. A. Pieters has been carrying on what is 
called Newspaper Evangelism, thus pioneering in a new 
field of endeavor and working out a method that is being 
extensively copied in other mission fields. By this method, 
not only are strong articles setting forth Christian doc- 
trine published broadcast in the papers, but various fol- 
low-up methods are pressed, with the result that, not only 
are converts won and worshiping groups established in 
remote districts, but a general knowledge of Christian 
truth is widely disseminated, and very much prejudice 
broken down. 


24 


i 

i 





RrR.vr. Church riR(un' 


CiiUKCH Erection 


The Mission has considered it wise policy to bear the 
heaviest part of the burden in the erection of churches for 
small congregations. Nothing seems so effective in bring- 
ing a congregation on to self-support as the possession of 
an adequate church and parsonage. It has erected, or 
helped to erect, buildings in Nagasaki, Saga, Sasebo, Ka- 
ratsu, Fukuoka, Oita, Usuki, Miyakonojo, Yamagawa and 
Kagoshima. Four of these congregations are now entirely 
independent of the Mission, and others well on the way to 
independence. 

In a sketch of this kind the development of the congre- 
gational life must be noted. It was in 1859 that Dr. Ver- 
beck arrived in Nagasaki, and in 1866 that he baptized the 
first convert, one Wakasa, who came to him from Saga. 
For years the increase of members was very slow, and, in 
the congregations, and in the classis which was later 
formed, the Missionary was not only the leader but the 
principal burden bearer. Today the congregations, larger 
and smaller, all contain more or less of people who are 
competent to attend to matters of detail, and the classis is 
able to take general care of the churches, leaving the Mis- 
sionary free to undertake operations of a more directly 
evangelistic nature. 

Tokyo. Yokohama and Izu 

In the region centering at Tokyo, the first evangelistic 
operations were confined to the cities of Tokyo and Yoko- 
hama. In 1872 the first Protestant church in the empire 
was organized in Yokohama, largely through the efforts of 
Rev. J. H. Ballagh. This church is now large and influen- 
tial, though at its organization there were but nine mem- 
bers. It is known as the Kaigan (Seashore) church. Mr. 
Ballagh was a man of great energy and profound faith, 
and it was inevitable that he should overcome all difficul- 
ties and engage in wide evangelistic endeavor. During the 
years that followed, we find him working south along the 
Tokaido, with congregations at Mishima, Koyama and 
Gotemba resulting. He passed over into Shinshu, and con- 
gregations at Matsumoto, Ueda, Nagano and other towns 

26 



27 


AT Ki’KUOK. 


resulted. During his whole life he felt the burden espe- 
cially of the spiritual welfare of these and other congre- 
gations, and was never so happy as when visiting them 
and preaching for them. 

Shinshu and the Northwest 

In 1897 Mr. and Mrs. F. S. Scudder took up their resi- 
dence at Nagano, and worked for that city and the other 
towns in that neighborhood. The Misses Deyo and Brokaw 
at one time lived at Ueda, on the same field. Ten years 

before this. Rev. E. R. Miller and wife had gone to the 

northern part of the island and opened up work in Morioka. 
For many years Mr. Miller was the apostle of that region, 
the extreme northern city of Aomori being finally opened 
up, and Miss Leila Winn taking up residence there. Miss 
Winn was connected with the Mission for thirty-eight years, 
engaging in evangelistic work at Aomori, Mishima and 
other interior points most of the time. Messrs. Kuyper, 
Shafer and Ruigh all resided for a longer or shorter period 

at interior points on this field, and did their share in the 

gathering and building up of congregations. 

Union and Withdrawal 

It is the experience of every Mission that, as the work 
develops and enlarges, and new methods are called for, it 
is necessary either to restrict the field, make combinations 
with other Missions, or increase the number of workers. 
Ours has been no exception. Meiji Gakuin and Sturges 
Seminary are now both union schools, carried on in con- 
junction with the Presbyterians. There has been some 
increase in the number of Missionaries, but by 1917 it had 
become necessary to withdraw from some of our fields in 
the north and concentrate our evangelistic efforts in 
Kyushu. 

It required considerable time to effect the change, but 
eventually the far northern field, with work at Morioka, 
Aomori and some smaller towns, was handed over to the 
Mission of the Reformed Church in the United States, and 
the work west of Tokyo, in Shinshu, was undertaken by 
the Missionary Society of the Church of Christ in Japan, 


28 


with which we have long co-operated, in consideration of a 
decreasing subsidy. This leaves still in our hands a cer- 
tain amount of evangelistic work in Tokyo and in the 
province of Izu, about eighty miles south of it. 

In rapidly sketching the work of so many years, covering 
so wide a territory, we are in some danger of fixing our 
thought too closely on the growth of congregations and 
their development, especially as brought about by the efforts 
of ordained Missionaries and Japanese evangelists. We 
must not overlook the fact that much of the work for the 
Kingdom brings forth invisible results also ; results not 
readily tabulated. In both north and south our unmarried 
Missionary ladies and Missionary wives, laboring in season 
and out of season, have accomplished results that can never 
be fully known and appreciated. 

It is very easy to forget the past, and one looking over 
the Japanese Church in Tokyo and Yokohama, to say 
nothing of Shinshu and the Tohoku, might very easily fail 
to appreciate that work that is now self-supporting, or near- 
ing self-support, would never have come into existence at 
all had it not been for the work of our own and other Mis- 
sions. Similarly, there is nothing to indicate that the very 
prosperous Fukuin Shimpo, the best Christian newspaper in 
the country, and proudly self-supporting, depended on 
Mission backing for its life through its years of infancy. 

These papers have been written from the standpoint of 
a single Japan Mission of the Reformed Church in 
America. It would be historically inexcusable to fail to 
note that while for many years at the beginning, and since 
1917, the Mission has been one, there was a period of 
nearly thirty years when, on account of the wide separa- 
tion of the parts of the field and the difficulty of adminis- 
tration, the work was organized as the North and the 
South Japan Missions. 

Conclusion 

Great changes are taking place in Japan. It would be 
a bold man who would dare attempt anything like a detailed 
prophecy of the future. . But some boldly outlined facts 
may well be borne in mind. Our Mission schools are pros- 


29 


perous as never before, although it is much harder to hold 
them closely to their spiritual purpose. The Japanese 
Church is growing in strength and evangelistic zeal. Japan- 
ese Christians will take an ever-increasing share in the 
conduct of our schools, and may at a not far distant day 
succeed to their management and support. The methods of 
evangelistic work, and the relations of the churches to it, 
are all subject to great change, although it is yet far 
from clear what these changes are to be. It is clear, how- 
ever, that to an increasing degree God’s Spirit is manifest- 
ing itself in and through the Church, and spirit-filled men 
and women, foreigners and Japanese, have a great oppor- 
tunity to join hands and respond to the loud call of the 
spiritual needs of the Japanese Empire. 

MISSIONARIES OF THE JAPAN MISSION 

WENT OUT RETIRED 


Rev. S. R. Brown 1859 1879t 

Mrs. S. R. Brown 1859 1879 

Rev. G. F. Verbeck 1859 18981 

Mrs. Maria (Manion) Verbeck 1859 1898 

D. B. Simmons, M.D 1859 1860 

Mrs. D. B. Simmons 1859 1860 

Rev. James H. Ballagh, D.D 1861 19201 

Mrs. Margaret (Kinnear) Ballagh 1861 1909t 

Rev. Henry Stout 1869 19051 

Mrs. Elizabeth (Provost) Stout 1869 1902t 

Rev. C. H. H. Wolff 1871 1876t 

Mrs. L. (Buboc) Wolff 1871 1876 

Mrs. S. K. M. Hequembourg 1872 1874 

Miss Emma C. Witbeck 1874 1882 

Rev. E. Rotbesay Miller 1875 19151 

Mrs. Mary E. (Kidder) Miller 1869 lOlOf 

Rev. J. L. Amerman, D.D 1876 1893 

Mrs. Rebecca (Ely) Amerman 1876 1893 

Miss E. F. Farrington 1878 1879 

Miss M. J. Farrington 1878 1879 

Miss Harriet L. Winn 1878 1887 

Rev. Eugene S. Booth, D.D 1879 

Mrs. Emilie (Stelle) Booth 1879 1917t 


Mrs. Florence (Dick) Booth (1915-1919)* 1912 

30 


WENT OUT RETIRED 

Miss Carrie Ballagh 1881 1885 

Prof. Martin N. Wyckoff, Sc D 1881 19111 

Mrs. Anna (Baird) Wyckoff 1881 1920t 

Miss M. Leila Winn 1882 1920 

Rev. N. H. Demarest (1890-1912)* 1883 1914 

Mrs. Annie (Strong) Demarest 1883 1890t 

Rev. Howard Harris 1884 1905t 

Mrs. Lizzie B. (Disbrow) Harris 1884 1905 

Miss Mary E. Brokaw 1884 1899 

Miss C. B. Richards 1884 1885 

Rev. Albert Oltmans 1886 

Mrs. Alice (Voorhoorst) Oltmans 1886 

Miss Anna DeF. Thompson 1887 1913 

Miss Rebecca L. Irvine 1887 1893 

Rev. H. V. S. Peeke, D.D (1891-1893)*.. 1887 

Mrs. Vesta (Greer) Peeke 1893 

Miss Mary Deyo 1888 1905 

Miss Julia Moulton 1888 1922t 

Miss Carrie B. Lanterman 1890 1892t 

Rev. Albertus Pieters 1891 

Mrs. Emma (Kollen) Pieters 1891 

Miss S. M. Couch 1892 

Miss Harriet M. Lansing 1893 

Miss Martha E. Duryea 1893 1897 

Mr. A. A. Davis 1896 1898 

Rev. Jacob Poppen, Ph.D 1896 1898t 

Mrs. Anna (Van Zwaluwenburg) Poppen. 1896 1898 

Miss Anna K. Stryker 1897 1900 

Rev. Frank S. Scudder 1897 1907 

Mrs. Florence (Schenck) Scudder 1897 1906t 

Mrs. J. DuMont Schenck 1897 1902 

Miss Harriet J. Wyckoff 1898 1905 

Miss Anna B. Stout (1895-1898)* 1891 1905 

Rev. Charles M. Myers 1899 1904 

Rev. Garret Hondelink 1903 1908 

Mrs. Grace (Hoekje) Hondelink 1903 1908 

Miss Grace Thomasma 1904 1912 

Miss Jennie A. Pieters 1904 

Rev. Douwe C. Ruigh (from Amoy) 1905 

31 


Mrs. Christine (Carst) Ruigh (from went out retired 

Amoy) 1905 

Mr. Anthony Walvoord 1905 1919t 

Mrs. Edith (Walvoord) Walvoord 1905 1919 

Miss Jennie M. Kuyper 1905 

Walter E. Hoffsommer, Ph.D 1907 1920 

Mrs. Grace (Posey) Hoffsommer 1907 1920 

Rev. Willis G. Hoekje 1907 

Mrs. Annie (Hail) Hoekje 1912 

Miss Jennie Buys 1909 1914t 

Rev. Hubert Kuyper .'. 1911 

Mrs. May (Demarest) Kuyper (1914- 

1918)* 1912 

Miss Jeane Noordhoff 1911 

Rev. David Van Strien 1912 1920 

Mrs. Eleanor (Orbison) Van Strien 1912 1913t 

Mrs. Lillian (Orbison) Van Strien 1917 1920 

Rev. Luman J. Shafer 1912 

Mrs. Amy (Hendricks) Shafer 1912 

Rev. Stephen W. Ryder 1913 

Mrs. Reba (Snapp) Ryder 1914 

Miss Hendrine E. Hospers 1913 

Miss Evelyn F. Oilmans 1914 

Miss Janet Oilmans 1914 

Rev. Alex. Van Bronkhorst 1916 

Mrs. Helena (DeMaagd) Van Bronkhorst. 1916 

Rev. Henry V. E. Stegeman 1917 

Mrs. Gertrude (Hoekje) Stegeman 1917 

Miss Anna M. Fleming 1918 

Mr. A. L. Harvey 1920 1921 

Miss Edith V. Teets 1921 

Miss J. Gertrude Pieters 1921 

Mr. George W. Laug 1921 

Miss Dora Eringa 1922 

Rev. John Ter Borg 1922 

Miss Amelia Sywassink 1922 

Mr. Gerald A. Mokma 1922 

Miss Florence C. Walvoord 1922 

Miss Flora Darrow 1922 

Miss Gladys W. Hildreth 1922 

Miss Florence V. Buss 1922 


* Service intermitted. t Deceased. 




